FAST AND FURIOUS STYLE MIAMI COPPER CABLE CAPER SOLVED

January 28, 2018

Million dollar Miami Copper Cable Caper Solved, Cable Thieves get 4+ years in the Pen

Miami, Florida (Cable-X Wire & Cable Industry News)

You’ve heard it all now, truly…

Sure, there have been pipes and wires missing from buildings, and a reel or two gets torn from an industrial yard, but that is not what happened in this case as two Miami men took a page straight from Fast & The Furious.

They trailed 16-Wheeler’s, hijacking and stealing over $1.3 Million dollars worth of Copper Wire from Southwire and Hussey Copper Company in what will surely go down as strange of a copper cable caper as you will ever hear.

Who were the Copper Thieves in this copper cable caper?

The thieves were Yosvani Castillo and Rodolfo Arteaga Oliva federal prosecutors in Rome, Ga., said. It is not known at this time whether either has been convicted in the past of other crimes, or the immigration status of either man involved.

No mention of other accomplices was made to our knowledge.

How did they get away with this copper cable caper – Initially?

Once they Fast & Furious hijacked and boarded the Semi-Truck full of copper wire they then drove the truck from near Southwire’s facility in Carrolton Georgia down to Miami, Florida where they sold the copper wire to a scrap yard under book value.

According to U.S. Attorney Byung “BJay” Pak, the charges, and other information presented in court: On several occasions, defendants Castillo and Oliva drove from Miami to Carrollton, and conducted surveillance on tractor-trailers as they left the Southwire facility to deliver copper products to customers across the country.

In addition to Southwire, the defendants also targeted truckloads leaving the Hussey Copper company in Pennsylvania on their way down to Georgia.

“Interstate cargo theft is an extremely serious offense that strains the local economy,” Pak said in a statement. “These thieves went out of their way to avoid detection and brazenly stole whole trucks filled with copper products.

The financial impact not only affected customers all over the country who buy these products, but they impacted the employees and communities where these companies operate.”

After stealing the Semi-trucks, the pair removed GPS trackers from the trucks and installed “jammers,” which are illegal signal-blocking devices that prevent any tracking of GPS devices or cellular phones essentially using a cloaking mechanism to make the truck full of copper wire disappear from the map.

Results of the Court case

The Georgia Bureau of Investigation Director Vernon Keenan said the conviction demonstrates “the great work of law enforcement at all levels” to investigate and prosecute major cargo theft affecting Georgia and our surrounding states.

Judge Harold Murphy sentenced Oliva, 40, to four years, nine months in prison, to be followed by three years of supervised release. Castillo, 38, was sentenced on May 10, 2017 to five years, three months in prison to be followed by three years of supervised release.

Both Oliva and Castillo were ordered to pay restitution, jointly and severally, in the amount of $1.1 million.

Castillo is separately responsible for paying an additional $276,142 in restitution.

Cable Finder?

While these thieves used a cloaking device to conceal their cargo, it can often times seem like there are “jammers” on when you need a copper cable or wire. Please feel free to use the Cable-X Cable Finder Team as your Personal Cable Finder Tool.

It’s completely free to use us and we always like a challenge of helping our readers find exactly the product they need, fast. Send us an email to wire@cable-x.com when you need to find a copper cable and don’t have time to play around.